Billy (48 page)

jack('!
design
by
Evan
Gaffm·y

j
ackt't
photograph
Unt
itl
(•d
(n
d )
'5790.
Dori'Ulman
Co
ll
ernon

S
1
e
li
.1I
Co
llec11on
s.
U111v(•r, 11y of
Oreon
L1hr.1ry

VIKING

VIKIN
G PENGUIN

a
divi
sion
of
l't
•nguin
Book
s
USA 111
..

-· -

:
175
llucl
son
S
tr
l'et
,
New
York.
N Y !0011
l'rinl
<".

-
.
.·

--
..
'

:_....
.
.:-
:z·
.-; -.--:_
:.--
.
::.
..
:

# ' • •• -- • ..

"Althoug
h 1 only knew Billy
Le
e
Turner
for
an
all too brief two hundred
and
fourteen
pages. Iwill mourn
hi
s
death for
the rest of my life. That's how
pow
erfu
lly and dramatically written this book is
.
"
-Claude
Brown
.
author of

MANCHILD
IN
THE
PROMISED LAND

"
Albert
French
makes an
asto
nishing literary debut with
this beautiful
first
novel. Richly
imagin
ed.
utterly convincing
in
its
l
yrica
l
idiom and
evocation of
place.
BILLY succeeds on multiple aesthetic
levels
.
not
l
east
of
which
is a power
ful and
frightening exploration
of
the
human
capacity for
injustice.
B
ILLY
is a
book that will stay with me
in my dreams." -Tim
O
'
Brien

"Once
I
started Albert French's
novel
.
I
couldn't
stop reading
. . . .
I kept trying to think
of a writer
who has done a
better
job of capturing in clear.
powerful
,
and authentic language the landscape
.
the people
. .
.
the air itself.
I
kept searching for
comparisons and
I kept
coming
up with masters of the art, from Aeschy
lu
s
to
Ernest
Gaines."
-David
Bradley

"A
lb
ert French has delivered a tale
that will
force us
to
sit
up
and
take notice and
remember.
It
will
make many of us mad
and
many of us sad
.
Mostly
.
it will
make us wonder."
-Eddy
L.
Harris

"French
presents
an old-fashioned
.
what-happens-next story, full
of
Mississipp
i
characters whose
living
a
nd
dying remind me of
the
Louisiana people
in
Ernest Gaines's work
. . . .
From
the first words, French
tells
an honest and compe
lling
story; and that
hone
sty
helps
crea
1e
characters who are not
eas
il
y
forgotten
."